“There’s tremendous medical hope here for a number of illness and we just want a right to vote on this,” said Bob Sutton. “The major issue here is to get it on the ballot and let the people of Florida decide.”

Sutton is a representative for United for Care, a campaign to get an amendment for the legalization of medical marijuana onto November’s general election ballot in Florida.

The group has collected close to 900,000 signatures, said Kim Russell, founder of People United for Medical Marijuana, the organization that runs the campaign and is responsible for authoring the amendment. The group is aiming for about 1 million signatures; at least 700,000 must be verified — match registered voters’ signatures on file — to qualify for the 2014 ballot.
Sutton has collected less than 50 signatures over the past few months at his petition post at Wewa RV Park and Trading Post, 2481 State 71 North in Wewahitchka.

“Probably a hundred people have come to me interested” in supporting legalizing medical marijuana, Sutton said, “but, they don’t want to sign the petition for fear the government will come on them. … It may be fear of reprisal.”

He said he wishes individuals who believe in the cause of medical marijuana could see it as a “democracy issue” because “everyone has a right to sign a petition.”

Opposition groups have a different opinion, particularly in regards to the language in the amendment.

In written statements and a signed brief presented to the state Supreme Court in December, anti-petition groups picked apart the amendment — calling it “misleading” — in the hope that the court will not allow the initiative on the ballot.

Calvina Faye, executive director at Save our Society from Drugs, was one of several anti-drug groups to sign the brief.
“We believe that sick people deserve legitimate medicine,” Fay said. “This isn’t about medicine; this is about legalization, period.”

Sheriff Grady Judd, president of the Florida Sheriff’s Association, also signed the brief.

“There are loopholes big enough to sail aircraft carriers through” the amendment, Judd said Saturday. “It is being sold to the public as medical marijuana for those that are significantly, severely ill, that have end-of-life issues with health, but the way the proposed constitutional amendment is written, it would literally take in everyone.”

In the amendment, “debilitating medical conditions” includes Crohn’s disease, hepatitis C, several life-threatening diseases such as AIDS and cancer, and “other conditions for which a physician believes that the medical use of marijuana would likely outweigh the potential health risk for a patient.”

“Do you want your physician, your firefighters, police officers, emergency medical services to have that kind of unfettered access to medical marijuana?” Judd rhetorically asked. So, “That’s why the Florida Sheriff’s Association does not endorse medical marijuana.”
According to a poll by Quinnipiac University, Floridians want to allow doctors to prescribe marijuana for medical conditions by an 82-16 margin. The ballot initiative must draw at least 60 percent support to pass.

Ben Pollara, campaign manager at United for Care, points to the poll as evidence the public is ready for legal medical marijuana.
“It’s another indication that Floridians are ready to support the legalization of marijuana despite their leaders” ignoring the issue by “putting their heads in the sand,” he said recently.

The next step is to wait on a ruling from the Supreme Court. The court has until April to rule on the amendment’s language.
“Hopefully we go on the ballot,” Pollara said.